I went DS 25m HC as disc today. For the sake of getting used to our new stuff, we raided without the Power of the Aspects-Debuff. Which was kinda fun at bosses like Morshok (Tank takes 2 200k hits in 2 seconds and dies), YorSahj (some new spells (propably tank self heals?) go crazy during purple phase) and Warmaster (mostly heavy incoming tank dmg again, and some other funny new things). We didn't kill WBH today, so we go for the last 3 bosses on sunday. Madness will be interesting! And I will propably go holy for Spine.

I didn't play beta this much, so I hadn't much time to practise before DS. But I can say: I pretty much like the 5.0.4 changes.

I have ~3k spirit atm (+Spine HC Trinket), mana felt OK. As many already have pointed out in this thread, mana management is important again. Not as important as it was at cata release, but, as expected, I can't spam PoH 24/7 as I did a week before with 1,4k Spirit.

I tried a int/SP>spirit/mastery>crit>haste reforge and took PW: Solace. I believe that Zonozz/Ultraxion/WBH are bosses where Mindbender could perform better than PW:Solace.

Here are some Logs if you are interested (WoL still tags them as 10m NHC and kills are invalid, oh noes ._.):

worldoflogsdotcom/reports/rt-6u3ejoh94huph5ib/sum/healingDone/?s=1739&e=1949 is Morshok
Zonozz disconnect and not logged worldoflogsdotcom/reports/rt-6u3ejoh94huph5ib/sum/healingDone/?s=3941&e=4332 is YorSahjworldoflogsdotcom/reports/rt-6u3ejoh94huph5ib/sum/healingDone/?s=5050&e=5281 is Hagaraworldoflogsdotcom/reports/rt-6u3ejoh94huph5ib/sum/healingDone/?s=6496&e=6776 is Ultraxion (took red buff)

Imo, the most important thing about disc atm is: knowing WHEN to do different things. Use SpS, cast smite, PW:So (or mindbender, heh), use AA and PoH, shield, use single target heals. Practice makes perfect, and "new" Disc takes time to get used to it now (at least for me). Probably more than before, but it's fun!

Another question with regards to DA if it stack like the following eg. PoH hits (for arguments sake) 1000 shield, but mastery of 30% makes it 1300 absorb?

If so and this ALSO works this way with S Shell wouldn't mastery be even stronger than it currently is seeing it now effect 3 spell Pw:S, DA and S Shell where as it previously only did it with DA and Pw:S.

Just a thought (no math backing this of course) and I know you did say your busy finishing that part but though i might as well put it out there

Glad we agree on mastery being stronger

Are you sure about Mastery > Int ?

Because thinking that Int gives more SP and Crit which I think will out weigh Mastery.

The value of solace is determined by how much you need to stop casting because you have no mana. If you can chain cast without solace then solace is useless. But the number of solace casts needed to get equal return with mindbender is a pretty misleading value. You also need time to use the extra mana. If you use all your free time to cast solace you won't cast any extra spells you will just end the fight with an excess of mana. So your free time needs to be used for both solace AND extra spells, meaning you can't cast as much solace as you think.

Any downtime whatsoever benefits mindbender as well as because during the downtime you don't spend much mana so you can use the time to chain cast more for the rest of the fight making it easier to hit the target number of casts per minute, which will make solace unecessary. As disc during downtime you need to build aegis stacks. Every solace casts means less aegis stacked for when the damage resumes.

In other words it takes a little bit of math to determine if solace is better than mindbender in a particular environment. Once you have about 13k spirit, mindbender is probably going to be better for disc. If you are tank healing however is most likely the best talent.

In general mindbender returns an extra 5.3% of your base mana per minute which is 15.9k per minute without the extra mana meta or 16.2k mana per minute with the meta. You need 8 casts of solace per minute to equal mindbender or 12seconds per minute. If you are not spending 12seconds per minute being oom with mindbender then mindbender is better.

Glyph of renew is good for discipline, because you hit the 1st breakpoint with zero haste. ALL renews cast within 5s of PWS will tick for 5 times without the glyph but 4 times with the glyph, which is pretty good HPCT and HPM for a spell that is really cheap in inner will. Movement fights for disc are all about being in inner will casting PWS, followed by borrowed time renews then pom, glyphed penance or holy fire and cascade in the downtime.

Angelic feather is far superior to body and soul. You can place the feathers up to a minute in advance and you can place them under the feet of someone who is kiting moving and they will get used instantly. In any fight where you have to run around its extremely beneficial to drop lots of feathers on the way there before hand and then you can maintain your speedboost for a very long time. Also if for example ppl need to move out of the raid because of a debuff you can drop feathers in their escape path and they will use them whenever they move out. You can replace the feathers when you have time and at no mana cost (instead of a whooping 18k) when you have time instead of having to react when they get the debuff. The only disadvantage to feathers is its tough to pick a particular person out if more than one person are in the same spot

The value of solace is determined by how much you need to stop casting because you have no mana. If you can chain cast without solace then solace is useless. But the number of solace casts needed to get equal return with mindbender is a pretty misleading value. You also need time to use the extra mana. If you use all your free time to cast solace you won't cast any extra spells you will just end the fight with an excess of mana. So your free time needs to be used for both solace AND extra spells, meaning you can't cast as much solace as you think.

Any downtime whatsoever benefits mindbender as well as because during the downtime you don't spend much mana so you can use the time to chain cast more for the rest of the fight making it easier to hit the target number of casts per minute, which will make solace unecessary. As disc during downtime you need to build aegis stacks. Every solace casts means less aegis stacked for when the damage resumes.

In other words it takes a little bit of math to determine if solace is better than mindbender in a particular environment. Once you have about 13k spirit, mindbender is probably going to be better for disc. If you are tank healing however is most likely the best talent.

In general mindbender returns an extra 5.3% of your base mana per minute which is 15.9k per minute without the extra mana meta or 16.2k mana per minute with the meta. You need 8 casts of solace per minute to equal mindbender or 12seconds per minute. If you are not spending 12seconds per minute being oom with mindbender then mindbender is better.

Thank you for your input, I am not very good at math, so this will help out.

Originally Posted by Havoc12

Angelic feather is far superior to body and soul. You can place the feathers up to a minute in advance and you can place them under the feet of someone who is kiting moving and they will get used instantly. In any fight where you have to run around its extremely beneficial to drop lots of feathers on the way there before hand and then you can maintain your speedboost for a very long time. Also if for example ppl need to move out of the raid because of a debuff you can drop feathers in their escape path and they will use them whenever they move out. You can replace the feathers when you have time and at no mana cost (instead of a whooping 18k) when you have time instead of having to react when they get the debuff. The only disadvantage to feathers is its tough to pick a particular person out if more than one person are in the same spot

I do not agree with this at all, I do not think of AF "Far Superior". I feel like Body and Soul will be more beneficial to the raid in MOST fights. You used the reason "You can place the feathers up to a minute in advance and you can place them under the feet of someone who is kiting moving and they will get used instantly" which is true, but you can do the same thing with Body And Soul, and you do not have to worry about someone accidently stepping on it and so forth. I feel like both choices have their pros/cons, and they will be used different ways to achieve the same effect. Therefor I do not feel like one is better than the other marginally.

I do not agree with this at all, I do not think of AF "Far Superior". I feel like Body and Soul will be more beneficial to the raid in MOST fights. You used the reason "You can place the feathers up to a minute in advance and you can place them under the feet of someone who is kiting moving and they will get used instantly" which is true, but you can do the same thing with Body And Soul, and you do not have to worry about someone accidently stepping on it and so forth. I feel like both choices have their pros/cons, and they will be used different ways to achieve the same effect. Therefore I do not feel like one is better than the other marginally.

For 4 secodns every 15 s compared with 12s out of 15s. Also PWS costs 18k mana, feathers are free. Furthermore you have to stop what you are doing right now and use it, while feathers can be down at the right place well ahead of time. In an encounter like Atramedes in BWD, AF is godly. Any fight where someone needs to move out of the raid fast AF is just awesome. Kiting the comet on ragg hc. You can do it forever with AF, but B&S is rubbish.

Seriously go and try using both talents to kite mobs and you will see what I mean.

From the current tier ambershaper is an awesome example. When you have a living amber+parasite its important to kite it, since healing it can get you killed. With feathers you can place 3 down in rapid succession on a path around the raid then use them at will to stay ahead f the living amber and cast. It costs you no mana and you can do it forever. B&S is really rubbish there. You will spend most of your time moving without speedboost and wasting tons of time.

The only thing that holds AF back is the need to move the targeting reticle on the screen and the fact that if lots of ppl are stacked you cant pick one of them. While B&S can be clicked on the raid frames. That makes AF harder to use. Basically the tradeoff between AF and B&S is that AF much more powerfull and efficient, but B&S is much easier to use. That makes AF far superior to B&S for anyone capable of using it correctly. The sheer mana cost of PWS alone, makes B&S an exceptionally inefficient talent. There is no guarantee that the PWS you cast will proc rapture or even worse that it will get used. At 18k mana a pop with 306 total mana pool, it's not a joke to waste PWS like that. Its more expensive than flash heal.

There is no way B&S is going to be more useful. If there is a need to kite stuff AF is not only far stronger it also does not require you to drop what you are doing and give someone a boost and a boost can be given to multiple people simultaneously. Intelligent placement of feathers also means people have access to speedboosts even if you are not in range. AF is definitely a far more powerful talent.

Also I think you didn't mention that ToF procs from damaging the boss. That means putting pain on the boss or any mob at <15% gives you a 30s boost to healing. Spend 1 GCD every 1 seconds and get 10% more healing for up to 15% of the fight at minimum. On a fight like elegon for example where the last 15% is a burn phase with massive healing. ToF is actually a great choice for holy. Unfortunately for disc ToF is useless because t does not work with spirit shell or with PWS. Since that is like 50% of our healing, ToF has half the value for disc than it does for holy. Hopefully blizzard will fix that though, which means Power Infusion wont be the only viable option in that tier.

Divine insight adds the most HPS to single target healing, but is unsustainable in terms of mana usage because you can't really afford to cast PWS without rapture.

One thing that has been giving me a headache is how many GCDs my CDs eat now if I want to maintain peak efficiency. For a 1.25 minute slice of a fight 35/45 GCDs are used just for my CDs.
For reference I took PI and Mindbender for spec. I did not include casting PI, PS, PW:B, or IF on the list. Things I did include were 5xPW:S rapture/min (it is a mana gain currently and will be again come T15 spirit levels), SS 1/min, Smite 4/min, HF 6/min, AA 2/min, Mindbender 1/min, PoM 6/min, and penance 6/min. Since the time listed was 1.25 minutes, the 1 minute "you should use this on CD" abilities will come up twice. even if you shaved off 3-5 GCDs a minute thats still 2/3 of our time mostly casting buffs.

One thing that has been giving me a headache is how many GCDs my CDs eat now if I want to maintain peak efficiency. For a 1.25 minute slice of a fight 35/45 GCDs are used just for my CDs.
For reference I took PI and Mindbender for spec. I did not include casting PI, PS, PW:B, or IF on the list. Things I did include were 5xPW:S rapture/min (it is a mana gain currently and will be again come T15 spirit levels), SS 1/min, Smite 4/min, HF 6/min, AA 2/min, Mindbender 1/min, PoM 6/min, and penance 6/min. Since the time listed was 1.25 minutes, the 1 minute "you should use this on CD" abilities will come up twice. even if you shaved off 3-5 GCDs a minute thats still 2/3 of our time mostly casting buffs.

Me too! I couldn't keep up in heroic DS
please post this as feedback on battle.net priest forums if you can. You expressed this better than I did

"Healing is a game of Hungry Hungry Hippos. All the healers try to gobble all the marbles up. Disc priests take the marbles off the board."

One thing that has been giving me a headache is how many GCDs my CDs eat now if I want to maintain peak efficiency. For a 1.25 minute slice of a fight 35/45 GCDs are used just for my CDs.
For reference I took PI and Mindbender for spec. I did not include casting PI, PS, PW:B, or IF on the list. Things I did include were 5xPW:S rapture/min (it is a mana gain currently and will be again come T15 spirit levels), SS 1/min, Smite 4/min, HF 6/min, AA 2/min, Mindbender 1/min, PoM 6/min, and penance 6/min. Since the time listed was 1.25 minutes, the 1 minute "you should use this on CD" abilities will come up twice. even if you shaved off 3-5 GCDs a minute thats still 2/3 of our time mostly casting buffs.

Although you are quite correct about this being a serious problem for disc, u made a mistake u cant use aa 2/min, because it does not work with spirit shell. Max is 1.5/min, but its quite complicated to do so. Spirit Shell, IF and AA also don't take up GCDs. Also you forgot cascade. You should not be casting smite. Its a major waste of time and mana. Penance and HF on CD on the boss is the way forward. Every smite you cast is lost healing.

Maximising all our CDs as disc means minimising clashes and that makes for extremely complicated and counterintuitive gameplay. I posted a list of easy fixes for this in the EU forums, but I don't think anyone really reads those.